In the emerging netbook market, Google decided it would announce a new-style Linux-based OS that would be perfect for netbook owners, set for release in Q4 2010. Recently, Google has also showed off a new application market for Chrome and Chrome OS. We at The PC Report have used Chrome OS briefly when it was first released, but today we’ve taken an in-depth look at the OS and how it will affect the OS and netbook markets.
A few days ago Fedora pushed out a new version of their popular Linux operating system. Version 13, codenamed “Goddard” adds a new feature called PackageKit which identifies when printers are plugged in and automatically downloads and installs the drivers for the device – very handy. The installation process using Anaconda has been streamlined, and the network manager has been improved for mobile broadband users along with a new GUI. The open-source ATI and Nvidia drivers have also been improved.
If you’re interested in downloading Fedora 13, check out this page here. If you;re unsure on whether to upgrade to this version, you may find more new features that you like in the extensive release notes.
Lucid Lynx has been released. You can download it here. Torrents will be the fastest way to obtain it since all of the servers will probably be bogged down from massive numbers of downloads.
Mark Shuttleworth has announced in his blog that Ubuntu 10.10 will be using Maverick Meerkat as it’s mascot. It appears as if they are going to keep using the same naming trend they have used on previous Ubuntu releases. All names are in alphabetical order such as Jaunty Jackalope, Karmic Koala, Lucid Lynx, and now Maverick Meerkat, just to name a few. The exceptions to this are the first two releases, Warty Warthog and Hoary Hedgehog.
Ubuntu 10.10 Maverick Meerkat is scheduled to be released on October 28, 2010 (10/28/10).
Have you heard people talking about Linux but had no idea what it was? Are you a full time Windows XP, Vista, or 7 user and can’t understand why anyone would want to use anything besides Windows? Or perhaps you are getting tired of dealing with the hassle that can come with Windows but you don’t know what to do about it? If you answered yes to any of these questions then this is something you should probably read. There is a lot to Linux. I will probably leave a lot out of this article but, then again, this is not a comprehensive guide. This is just to give you a peek at Linux so you can decide if you want to try it out.
Ubuntu 10.04 (Lucid Lynx) is only in the Alpha stage of testing at this moment. It doesn’t look extremely different from the current version of Ubuntu but there are a few noticeable differences.
I installed Lucid Lynx using VirtualBox OSE. Before I installed, I booted up from the LiveCD just to get a look at it to see if anything looked different. After a quick glance it looked just like most other recent Ubuntu releases. The background is a brown/orange color, the UI is gray, and everything is still set up the same.
It only took around 20 minutes to install on a virtual machine with just over 700 MB of RAM and a 2.16 GHz processor. I haven’t timed any of my other installations but this one seemed to be the fastest of them all. I decided to dig a little to find out what has been changed. The first things I checked were the applications.
Like Linux and also want a small desktop PC? Try out the Open-PC Atom powered nettop designed specifically for those of you who use and love Linux. It comes with hardware that requires only completely free drivers and no proprietary software at all – an Atom N330 dual-core CPU at 1.6GHz, an ASrock motherboard, 3GB of RAM, Intel GMA950 graphics, a 160GB hard drive all in a mini-ITX case with 250W PSU. It also comes preloaded with a KDE-based Linux distro configured for the computer’s hardware.
The Open-PC will be available at the end of February for €359.
For everyone not using Windows, the wait to access Google’s Chrome as your web browser (officially) is now over, as Google has released a public beta for all you Mac OS X and Linux users. Unfortunately, the Mac/Linux versions aren’t as feature-filled as their Windows counterpart, but still carry enough features to make it a good enough browser to replace your current one.
While the speed and process per tab benefits of Chrome are in the Mac/Linux versions, things such as extensions, the bookmark manager and support for Google Gears are still missing. However it looks like the Mac Chrome edition integrates well with the OS X interface and utilises some key features such as native spell-check, keychain support and Mac-specific animations. The interface also fits in well with the overall Mac look, and the Linux version isn’t too bad either.
You can download the beta version of Chrome for Mac (OS X 10.5 or later) or Linux (Debian/Ubuntu/Fedora/openSUSE) from the respective downloads pages.
We were almost right when we said that Chrome OS was launching next week. Today, Google held a conference to announce and detail their latest and greatest venture into operating systems. While Chrome OS hasn’t been launched yet, and according to Google it won’t be for a long time with a public beta still a fair while away, we do get to see some solid pictures and demonstrations of Chrome in action.
First off, its seems like Chrome OS is almost completely web-based, with web applications integrating into the operating system to make it feel like they are real applications. This is all made possible by the features present in HTML5, which allow web applications to access local storage and other resources that a normal application would have access too. Also, even though Chrome OS is based off the Linux kernel, you wont be able to install applications via the kernel like you would in other Linux distros, instead you will have to run them through the “browser.”
Red Hat have just announced the release of Fedora 12.
New in Fedora 12 is improved webcam support, improved video codecs, audio improvements, improved power management, an automatic bug reporting tool as well as a number of other enhancements (release notes).
You can download Fedora 12 here.
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